


pyrrhic

by bombcollar



Category: Dark Souls (Video Games)
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-26
Updated: 2017-09-26
Packaged: 2019-01-05 17:24:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,016
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12194358
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bombcollar/pseuds/bombcollar
Summary: The goddess pays a visit to the dying knight, but you cannot shame a person who has no shame.





	pyrrhic

_“My knight...”_

In the dark red haze of pain, her voice is a beacon, a brilliant flame. Warm as her copper skin, her golden hair, the pearls of her smile beneath her mask. Every precious metal a lump of soil compared to her beauty. Her many hands envelop his, at the same time as they caress his chest and neck, take his helmet and slide it off his head. Blood smears his cheeks like rouge with its passing, oozing from his lips, his nostrils, hair sticking to his cheeks. He lies dying, and he fears this will be the last before his quest is done, and when he comes back, he won’t be himself any longer. That is, if he comes back at all.

At least he can hear her voice one last time. His Fina, the one he’d forsaken everything for. Memories of home, of family, if he’d ever had one, and if he did perhaps it had been worth forgetting. His eyelids flutter, light stinging his eyes. He still cannot properly see her. It is like looking at the sun.

_“Thou hast suffered much, my knight.”_

Her voice, like wind stirring golden strands of wheat, promising idyllic comfort, warm grass in the late summer sun. She asked so little of him... Just Humanity. What were any of _them_ , compared to her. They were plain, filthy. Squatting in the darkness, hoarding what should be hers, what should be _his_ , to empower himself in order to better serve her. Endless pools of it, rich black ichor, the finest wine sealed away in a filthy bottle, smothered, _wasted_.

It was _his_ ... And that undead lout had come and _taken_ it. He knew the fool would have bitten, the bait was too tantalizing, and he’d have gotten one more scrap of Humanity out of them. He’d thought for sure... But alas. Suppose it couldn’t have gone on forever. But if he was to die in her arms, he could die happy. Whatever happened next was of little consequence.

Lautrec’s eyes slip closed. He expects to feel her many-armed embrace, the one he’d worn on his chest for years in hopes that he would experience the real thing some day. But that warmth does not come. Instead, the hands caressing his wrists become cold, scaly coils encircling him, binding his arms to his sides. The fingers once warm and gentle on his face now dig their nails in, daggers in the soft flesh beneath his jaw, forcing his head up as his eyes open wide in shock and discomfort.

The Dark Sun looks so _young_ , her features are soft, maidenlike, her round cheeks and delicate pink lips, no older than the fire keeper had been. It stands in disconcerting contrast to the lethal spines of her crown, the tiny, sharp teeth that show when she smiles, cold as a winter’s morning. The amber light once bathing the hall has gone, leaving the area in deep bluegreen shadow, shafts of moonlight falling in through the windows. Though he’d never seen her before or heard any account of her appearance, he knew this must be the elusive goddess of the moon.

“You think you drag your filth into my home, to host your games in my parlor...” she murmurs. Her serpents hover around him, a silent jury in ivory scales.

In spite of the growing coldness in his limbs, he smirks, coughs out a harsh chuckle. “Why’d you do this, Dark Sun? Pull the rug out from under me like that? I knew it was too good to be true...”

At this, Gwyndolin says nothing for a moment, her expression impassive, only the moonlight glinting off the headpiece to show she was anything more than a statue. “...do you really believe she loved you, knight? That all who bear that armor are embraced in the end? That it was worth killing that poor girl, hacking her apart in the darkness of her prison? Is this what your _goddess_ wanted? That she would still love you, after what you've done?” Her grip tightens subtly, nails digging into his pale, stubbly flesh.

Lautrec seems like he wants to chuckle again, but only wheezes, his chest moving up and down with his shallow breaths. “Does it matter? I might be a dead man, Dark Sun, but I guarantee I’ll die happier than you will. I found purpose in serving my goddess... and I find purpose in dying for her.”

Her coils do not loosen, though he makes no attempt to reach for his fallen weapons, or to struggle from her grip. Her thumbs smear the blood on his face, and she lets his head drop back to the floor. Gwyndolin had met Fina herself, a long time ago, been enamored with her as so many others had. But she had only been a child then, starry-eyed and envious of the elder goddess’s power to ply others with her will. What a goddess needed Humanity for, Gwyndolin didn’t know. Perhaps she didn’t need it at all. Perhaps this man was simply a liar, a leech seeking justification to prey on those already trapped and helpless. Those bound to their duties for the good of the world's continued existence. She herself was lucky, being a goddess with illusions and magic to thwart those who'd seek her out, but the fire keeper had not had that privilege.

And after him, more of his ilk would come. More heretics tracking their filth all over her kingdom. To whom it did not matter if they knew the truth. It only meant she had more work to do. What satisfaction was there in calling a man a fool when he’d already left a trail of innocent death in his wake. There was no vengeance to be found here, just emptiness.

It isn’t long before he expires, blood drying in the joints of his armor, smeared across the tiles  like a wedding train where he’d dragged himself. Gwyndolin leaves his body to be picked over by the next undead who came along, and goes to wash his blood off her hands.

 


End file.
